


Draconic for Beginners (The Asylum Remix)

by Poetry



Category: Original Work
Genre: Cultural Differences, Friendship, Gen, Languages and Linguistics, Recovery, Refugees
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-16
Updated: 2019-09-16
Packaged: 2020-09-06 11:48:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,560
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20290969
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Poetry/pseuds/Poetry
Summary: Five words that Shania learned to speak during her first year as a refugee in the dragonlands.





	Draconic for Beginners (The Asylum Remix)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [scribblemyname](https://archiveofourown.org/users/scribblemyname/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Shelter](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16285613) by [Liana Mir (scribblemyname)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/scribblemyname/pseuds/Liana%20Mir). 

> See endnotes for content warnings.

# 0\. Tzwazkíy

All through the Free Cities and the fiefdoms surrounding, refugees are beaten, rounded up, conscripted, despised. But if they cross the half-drained swampland to the west, out past the fields of refuse of the Free Cities, no one stops them. If they can make it past pools of toxic waste, mountains of rotting garbage, and junkyards of rusting warships, they reach a desolate land full of limestone caverns and underground rivers, where they will be taken as curiosities, at least, if not as neighbors. 

(Better to be a curiosity than vermin.)

The people of the Free Cities call this place _the dragonlands_, and put up walls of trash to separate themselves from it, not daring to venture there even with their finest powered war-chariots.

The dragons themselves call it Tzwazkíy.

# 1\. Bíqojàkh

If Shania was going to learn to speak Draconic, the first thing she was going to learn how to say was the name of her kind host, who took her in and provided for her when no human in the Free Cities could even dare to meet her eyes.

She knew that his name meant _Gleaming Scales_; she was getting the hang of written Draconic from reading through his library. The trick was replicating what he said when she pointed to the glyphs of his name.

“Biqojakh,” she said again. She was getting better at the harsh, gurgling sound at the end of the name. 

The dragon gave the dismissive flick of his tail that meant _no_. He said it again, tilting his head as he spoke like a curious bird. 

“Biqojakh,” Shania said, adding a bit more of a click to the _q_ sound.

He flicked his tail again and reached out with a single outstretched claw. He curved it against Shania’s cheek. The point of the claw was very, very close to her eye. She licked her dry lips and held still. The dragon had never hurt her, had only ever been kind to her, but it was hard not to be terrified by that huge pearly claw on her face. He said his name again with that alien little head-tilt. 

“Biqojakh,” Shania said, and as she spoke, he gently tilted her head from side to side. Then he dropped his claw, gave her space. “Oh!” she said. The head-tilt wasn’t like a bird’s, a head movement to give him a different view. It was part of the language. She had to tilt her head to say it right. She swayed her head up and to the right, then down and to the left as she spoke. “Bíqojàkh.”

Bíqojàkh made a little whistling noise through his nostrils, sending up twin trails of smoke, that meant an excited _yes_.

# 2\. Tzyêsij

“My friend Ksámkharjâ is coming to visit,” Bíqojàkh told Shania, a week later, pointing at the clumsily scrawled glyphs he’d written for his friend’s name. She studied the large paper they used as notes to communicate when spoken language failed. Ksámkharjâ meant _Flames Excessively_. “He has many questions about you. About humans. He shelters a human too.”

Shania didn’t understand the word _ at first_, so she repeated it back to him, and he shakily wrote out the glyph. She nodded. “Which human?” Bíqojàkh had had quite a few of them housed in his caverns, early on in Shania’s stay here.

__

“The little one,” Bíqojàkh said.

__

Shania remembered the boy, of course. Evrim. An orphaned refugee from the streets of the Free Cities, like her. “He’s so small,” she said. “Can Ksámkharjâ care for him? He can’t feed himself, like I do.” She had a hard time imagining a dragon being physically capable of cooking up and serving portion sizes so small.

__

“I told Ksámkharjâ what you eat,” Bíqojàkh said. “And he has two small children.” He gestured with his tail in the air to show their height, maybe half again as tall as Shania. “They do for him what Ksámkharjâ cannot do.”

__

Shania had a lot to discuss with Ksámkharjâ, and she wanted to make a good impression on Bíqojàkh’s friend. She knew there were certain smells Bíqojàkh likes: big sachets full of oil-soaked earth that smelled like deserts. So when Ksámkharjâ was due to arrive, she hauled out one of the sachets and held it out to him at the cavern entrance. 

__

Bíqojàkh’s golden slit-eyes widened. He snatched the sachet out of her arms, taking care not to graze her with his claws. “No! That is tzyêsij!” Shania didn’t recognize the word, but committed it to memory, including the sharp backward jerk of his head in the middle.

__

“I don’t know that,” Shania said helplessly. She hoped Bíqojàkh would forgive her for whatever transgression this was.

__

“Later,” he said, indicating Ksámkharjâ with his tail. He lowered his head to the earth to greet his friend, and Shania did the same. 

__

When Bíqojàkh rose and said, “Welcome,” Shania said it too.

__

“It _does_ speak!” Ksámkharjâ said, delighted.

__

“_She _does speak,” Shania corrected.

__

Ksámkharjâ did have a lot of questions for her. She dodged the ones about the Free Cities and where she came from, but talked freely about what it was like to live in Bíqojàkh’s cavern and how she’d been learning Draconic. When her spoken vocabulary ran out, as it frequently did, she got out paper and charcoal and they’d puzzle things out from her glyphs. 

__

Later, she asked the dragons, “What does tzyêsij mean?”

__

Their eye-slits widened. They spoke to each other too fast for Shania to follow. Bíqojàkh took charcoal and paper and scribbled a glyph. She looked at it and shook her head. Still unfamiliar. Bíqojàkh looked despairing. He ran a paw over the soft rug underneath them, gently tinkled the chandelier in the cavern ceiling, caressed the tea set he had set out for himself and Ksámkharjâ. “Tzyêsij.” 

__

Finally Shania got it. “Your hoard. You were angry because that –” She pointed to the perfume sachet – is your hoard. I can’t give it to Ksámkharjâ.”

__

Bíqojàkh whistled a yes through his nostrils. Ksámkharjâ made a grinding sound in his throat – surprised laughter.

__

“But you let me use your stuff whenever I want,” Shania said. 

__

Bíqojàkh curled his tail around Shania. “Yes. You are tzyêsij too.” 

__

There was something kind of creepy about that. But mostly, Shania was just relieved.

__

__

# 3\. Ksãjuzh

__

Shania burrowed deeper into her pile of threadbare blankets and crumpled newspapers. Boots rang harshly on the pavement. The city watch were going to find her. They were coming closer, they were shouting, they were tearing away her protective cocoon and hauling her into the light of a streetlamp, they were binding her wrists behind her back –

__

She woke to a rumbling underneath and all around her. Her eyes snapped open, and she was face to face with a huge dragon. She screamed and hid her face in the huge blanket. 

__

“Shan-ya,” the dragon intoned. “I am Bíqojàkh. You are of my tzyêsij. You are in my cavern.”

__

Shania dropped the blanket. She was in her usual sleeping spot, the warm spot between Bíqojàkh’s wings where the scales were soft and supple like leather. She took deep breaths. 

__

“Ksãjuzh?” Bíqojàkh said, with a back-and-forth head wobble.

__

“What does that mean?” Shania said. 

__

“When evil touches you in your sleep.”

__

“Yes,” Shania admitted. 

__

“Tell me,” Bíqojàkh said.

__

Shania considered it. She had no idea how to explain. Dragons didn’t have a city watch – they didn’t even have a city, as far as she could tell. If they had wars, or refugees, or laws about where they could or not go, Shania had not read about them in any of their books. She tried anyway. “I left the human lands because I had no home. I tried to find one, but other humans always ran me away. That’s what the ksãjuzh was.”

__

“Every young one must dig their own cavern,” Bíqojàkh said, in the cadence of a proverb or a classic quotation. “It is not this way among the humans?”

__

“No,” Shania said. She curled her blanket back around herself in a cocoon.

__

“Shan-ya,” Bíqojàkh said, rumbling beneath her. “I will not run you away.”

__

Somehow, Shania managed to get back to sleep.

__

__

# 4\. Etzlolaqá

__

Shania had come to Bíqojàkh with only the clothes on her back, and though she washed them frequently and mended them as needed, they were getting tattered. She wrote a note for Bíqojàkh saying DO YOU HAVE ANY FABRIC, because she didn’t know how to say fabric aloud. 

__

I HAVE CURTAINS AND BEDSPREADS, Bíqojàkh wrote back, which took a dive into a dictionary for Shania to decipher. He added, WHY?

__

“I need more clothing.” She used the word in her own tongue, not the trade-talk of the Free Cities but her _own_, because dragons didn’t have clothing, and tugged on her shirt to show what she meant. “I could cut up the…” She pointed to the glyphs for CURTAINS and BEDSPREADS.

__

Bíqojàkh took in a deep breath like he was about to flame. “No! You may not cut them!”

__

“Why not?” Shania said, confused. “Can I not use tzyêsij, because I am tzyêsij?”

__

“You may use tzyêsij,” Bíqojàkh confirmed. “But do you not understand etzlolaqá?” He said the word with a rightward head-tilt. 

__

Shania thought she might have seen that word in draconic books, but she had never understood it. “No.”

__

“When I clean the grease and ashes…” More note-scribbling and dictionary-consulting to figure out _grease_ and _ ash_. “When I clean them from your stove. When I polish my wall of shields.” That was the pride of Bíqojàkh’s tzyêsij: shields from the last war fought by the Free Cities against Holy Laurne, all the filth washed off and the dents hammered out. Shania hated looking at them. “When I bring you salts for your bath. That is etzlolaqá.”

__

“Taking care of the things you own,” Shania said, testing an idea.

__

“Yes. That is why you may not destroy my curtains and bedspreads.”

__

“But my clothing is getting old and ragged. Isn’t it etzlolaqá if you help me make new clothing?”

__

“I do not see why you need this _clothing_,” Bíqojàkh said, the Laurnese word crumbling to hard fragments in his mouth. 

__

Shania laughed. Of course a dragon wouldn’t understand clothing. “I’m not like you. Humans don’t have fire inside us like dragons. You know, from when I sleep on your back, right? I need warmth and protection from clothing.”

__

Bíqojàkh made a series of clicking noises in his throat, the sound of thought, like a “hmm” for a human. “The human lands make much waste, I have seen. Even of things that can still be good, with some etzlolaqá, like my shields. Do they do this with _clothing_, as well?”

__

“Yes,” said Shania, thinking of the textile factories in the Free Cities, constantly churning out new shirtwaists and stockings in accordance with the latest fashion. “Not all _clothing_ is –” She realized she had no idea how to say _sold_, or if dragons even had such a concept. “Used,” she finished.

__

“Then we will find where they throw it away,” Bíqojàkh said, “and we will clean and mend it for you.”

__

__

# 5\. Khàchawik

__

When they came home from a visit to Ksámkharjâ’s cavern, Shania said, “I worry about Evrim.”

__

“Why?” said Bíqojàkh, alarmed. “Is Ksámkharjâ’s etzlolaqá not enough?” 

__

“Ksámkharjâ cares for him well,” Shania said, and meant it; Evrim had a cold, and Ksámkharjâ’s daughters, Ixāsix and Chajālix, followed him around with little scraps of soft cloth tucked in the tips of their tails, covering and wiping away every cough and sneeze. “But there are things he cannot teach the boy. Did you know, Evrim asked me when he would start to flame like Ixāsix and Chajālix. I told him humans don’t flame, and he didn’t understand! There are things about being human that only a human can teach him.”

__

“If you would like to visit Ksámkharjâ’s cavern to teach Evrim human lessons, then of course you may,” Bíqojàkh said.

__

“There are human things I alone cannot teach Evrim,” Shania said. “And Evrim isn’t the only lost human child in a dragon’s cavern. We need a – where do dragons have lessons?”

__

“At home, from their parents,” Bíqojàkh said, politely puzzled.

__

“Even the dragons who wrote the books in your library? They learned how to do that at home?”

__

“Ah,” said Bíqojàkh. “No. Those are special lessons, for dragons who want to learn more. We go to khàchawik for that. A learning circle, where dragons may teach each other special skills.”

__

“That is what the humans in Tzwazkíy need,” Shania said. “Khàchawik.” She brightened with excitement. “Spring is here. My gardens out in the boneyards are growing nicely. I can go out and find a place for it. I’ll clean it up for human use, spread the word –”

__

“_No_,” Bíqojàkh said with a violent, denying flick of his tail. “You are tzyêsij. You stay with me!” He gathered her up to his breastbone with a clawed hand.

__

Shania shook against his scaly chest. She was just a half-grown woman in a tattered lacy shirtwaist and patched-up workman’s trousers, wanted nowhere and by no one except this cavern and this dragon, and even the little she had, she would push away. And for what? A ragtag group of equally pathetic refugees? She knew better than to put her trust in that fellowship; other displaced Laurnese had reported her to the watch for the sake of a few coins, or a little protection.

__

No. It was because she was _good_ at this, the translation, the navigation of a new place. That was her special skill, and what she needed more than clothing, shelter, or a dragon’s care was self-respect, the first thing to be stolen from her people when the invading army breached the sacred walls.

__

Shania said, muffled against Bíqojàkh’s scales, “Are Ixāsix and Chajālix of Ksámkharjâ’s tzyêsij?”

__

Above her, Bíqojàkh’s wings flared out in indignation. “No! They are his daughters!”

__

“Can any dragon be tzyêsij to another?” Shania said.

__

“Only if they are so reduced by sickness or improper behavior that they require etzlolaqá,” Bíqojàkh said.

__

“I was sick,” Shania said, tapping her forehead with two fingers. “Here, inside. I needed etzlolaqá. Now I am well. ‘Every young one must dig their own cavern.’ Is it not this way among dragons?”

__

Bíqojàkh was silent. Finally, he loosened his grip on her, and she could take a step back from him, breathe deeply. “I cannot help you find it,” he said. “If you are not tzyêsij, you must dig your own cavern now.”

__

Shania felt a sharp pang. She’d imagined Bíqojàkh scouting out places for her from above, moving stones out of the way with his claws. “I understand. But – you know all the dragons with humans in their tzyêsij. Can you tell them about the khàchawik? So the humans know where to go?”

__

“Of course,” Bíqojàkh said. “I am your friend, Shan-ya. It is only that I must be your friend as an equal, sovereign dragon now, as I am with Ksámkharjâ. I will come to the khàchawik, and I will learn, too.” 

__

“Oh,” said Shania. “Good. I – I guess I’d better pack, then.”

__

“Pack well,” Bíqojàkh said, with a friendly puff of smoke. “This is the last time I let you touch my tzyêsij, dragon.” 

__

Shania stifled a smile. She didn’t want his wall of shields, anyway.

__

**Author's Note:**

> Content warnings: police brutality, trauma flashbacks, possessive behavior.


End file.
